womensphere

Domestic violence kills one Russian woman an hour says report

A woman dies from domestic violence every 63 minutes in Russia, with more than 650,000 women beaten by their husbands and other relatives each year, a non-governmental organisation reported earlier in December.

The violence “results in the death of 14,000 women each year” in Russia, the ANNA women’s support group said in a report.

“In other words, this translates into another woman being killed by her husband once every 63 minutes,” the organisation’s president Marina Pisklakova told AFP.

She said the rate had remained relatively stable since 1995, although the interior ministry only began issuing official domestic violence figures in 2008.

For comparison, a woman is killed in a British domestic violence case once every three days, according to the Refuge women’s centre.

Pisklakova said the violence in Russia could be partially explained by a patriarchal society “in which women are accustomed to violence, which they treat as simple marital conflict.”

Though aware of the problem, Russian authorities have done little to help, Pisklakova said.

“There is one 35-bed (female) shelter in a Russian capital of 10 million inhabitants,” she said.